Monday, September 14, 2009

A Young Hero - Ring of the Nibelungen


The California Art Club held a Paint-out this past Saturday at the Maranatha High School campus in Pasadena. The event was in conjunction with the L.A. Opera's presentation of Richard Wagner's famous (or infamous) Ring Cycle, the massive tetralogy of Norse/Teutonic mythology. Several art students at the high school were recruited to pose for the artists in various tableaux through out the central walk on the campus. That walk is incredibly beautiful, with birch trees, waterfalls, a stream and a pond with Koi. I never knew high school could look so good!

In any event, this young man was sitting in a pensive pose with a rather cheesy feathered helmet. At least it was not as bad as the horned helmet another student wore (a subject for a later photo). Still, I thought it would make a nice portrait. I could not decide who he was supposed to be: Siegfried or Siegmund. He actually looked like Lohengrin, but that's another Wagnerian opera all together. Perhaps he was different Ring character, but he looked like a hero rather than a supporting member, so I'll call him Siegfried, the tragic and cursed son of the ill-fated brother and sister Siegmund and Sieglinde.

I did mention this was Wagnerian opera, didn't I?


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